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Sunday, 5 June 2011

Australia - a travel journal

Exactly 11 years today, I returned back to the UK from an amazing 3 month trip to Australia.

On 1st January 2000, I had taken voluntary redundancy and had become unemployed for the first time in 20 years. My time working for the London Borough of Hillingdon was at a welcome end! On the 5th February 2000, I got onto a British Airways flight to Hong Kong, for an 8 day stopover, before finally travelling on to Australia for a further 3 months.

A couple of weeks ago, quite by chance, I came across my online travel journal. I was shocked, but pleasantly surprised to see it was still online, albeit lost in the bowels of the fortune city website. I had lost the original html pages so it was a trip down memory lane.

So why the online journal? Well, it seemed like a good idea to keep family and friends updated on what I was doing, through a web page. Rather than send a long email or a boring postcard to everybody, they could see what I had been up to, and I also had the opportunity to add a few pics at some point on the trip! Back then, it was the equivalent of a blog but much more time consuming to update. However, with a long trip, there are plenty of opportunities to spend the time and effort.

I quickly decided to add the entries to this blog and I have rescanned the faded photographs, converting them to black and white to attempt to compensate for their jaded appearance.

Personally, I enjoyed re-reading the entries and reminiscing, and it was a labour of love. I had only realised when I had finished, and was writing this introduction that it was the 11th anniversary of my return.

Finally, it is likely only of interest or of significance to me, but if you want to read the journal, go here for day one of Hong Kong.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Paul Buck is a backpacker and Social Hiker, who loves to walk for fun and for good causes. Currently visiting all the tors of Dartmoor, accounts of that challenge can be found at moorlandwalks.co.uk. Adventures further afield are right here.